Improvement in machines for breaking flax and hemp



' A. FORSYTH.

Hemp Brake.

v Patented Jany'Qy 1838. I

UNITE STATES PATENT UFFICEO' ANDREW FORSYTH, OF COLUMBIA, TENNESSEE.

IMPROVEMENT IN MACHINES FOR BREAKING FLAX AND HEMP.

Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 550, dated January 9, 1838. I

horse power, and works on the. principle of v the saw-mill, having a sash, A, placed in a vertical frame, B B, worked by a crank, O, in the manner of a saw-mill gate. One or more brakes, D D, constructed in the usual manner, areplaced on one or both sides of v the frame and supported by and made fast to springs E E, the wide end of the brake placed toward the sash. The upper half of the brakes is in principle,

made fast to the lower part of the sash. The small end or head is held up by arms F F, fastened to the top of the sash, a brace eX- tending from one arm to the other near the lower end. The flax or hemp is fed in between the brakes by hand in the usual manner.

What I claim as my own invention, and not previously known in the above-described machine, is

The introduction of springs to support the lower part of the brake in the manner above described, or in any other substantially the same ANDREW FORSYTH.

i Witnesses:

JOHN B. J oHNsoN, WM. S. DRUMMOND. 

